


Changed in the Night

by devicing



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Dream Logic, Gen, Literary References & Allusions, Post-Game, Zine piece, Zine: Growth: a Danganronpa Post-Game Zine, this was very fun and cathartic to write
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:54:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26326720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devicing/pseuds/devicing
Summary: “This,” Maki declares, “is a dream.”Between the prismatic smattering of leaves above her, the grin—suspended in the air like a lazy, crescent moon—replies, “Whatevergave you that idea?”The voice is unmistakable.“How do you run from what is inside your head?” the Cheshire Cat once asked of Alice. Maki seeks her own answer.[V3 Post-game]
Relationships: Harukawa Maki & Oma Kokichi
Comments: 6
Kudos: 58





	Changed in the Night

**Author's Note:**

> Written for _Growth: a Danganronpa Post-Game Zine_ , an absolutely delightful project that I'm very thankful I got to work on!

“This,” Maki declares, “is a dream.”

Between the prismatic smattering of leaves above her, the grin—suspended in the air like a lazy, crescent moon—replies, “What _ever_ gave you that idea?”

The voice is unmistakable. Maki flinches before she can stop herself. But smiles don’t have eyes, she reasons, so there’s no need to think on it twice as she pushes on down the path. Her eyes stay fixed on the polished sheen of her spats as the path weaves and winds.

“Well, that’s no fun.” The voice echoes from ahead. There, on a gnarled old branch above her, sits the Cheshire Cat. The vertical slits of his pupils draw her attention first, haunting against the bright violet surrounding them, but it’s hard to ignore the pricked ears poking out from his hair—even more so the tail flicking back and forth behind his crossed ankles. “Better places to be?” he purrs.

His ears are a truly appalling shade of purple. A similarly-purple stripe spirals down his tail. Its twin—a bright shock of pink—causes something uncomfortable to curl in the pit of her stomach.

She casts the thought aside and her gaze off with it. The trunk of the tree below him is covered in nonsense signs, pointing every which direction. “ _Warehouse_ ” one reads. “ _Ultimate Child Caregiver Lab_ ” reads another. Pointing straight up to the Cat’s needling grin is one that simply says, “ _Exisal Hangar_.”

Maki’s mouth tightens. “I don’t have time for this,” she says.

The Cat chuckles. “Why, from where I’m standing, I’d say you’ve got all the time in the world! Trading in heartbeats for seconds on hours on years… what a rich little thing you are, to have so many to spare!”

Biting her tongue, she moves to sweep past the corkscrew stripes of his tail, but as fingers brush against fur, the lone purple stripe begins to snake up, fading into nothing. As it goes, she watches the Cat slowly wink out of existence, inch by inch.

As the soft curve of his cheeks begins to fade away, leaving only that horrid, crescent smile and those haunting, bright eyes behind, he asks, “Hey, would you trade me a heartbeat if I asked nicely, Harumaki-chan?”

Before she can answer, she shocks at the feeling of wetness across her hand. The remaining stripe of violent pink had begun to melt away, dripping down her fingers. Smearing across her palm.

Sucking in a sharp breath, she furiously wipes the evidence away on her pretty white pinafore.

Familiar laughter echoes through the dark, “ _No, you wouldn’t, would you?_ ”

She hurries away from the sound.

* * *

The theme of this dream is far from subtle, so when Maki finds a small gate at the end of the path, it’s not hard to imagine what lies beyond. She searches for a detour, but the brambly hedge walls on either side of the picket gate stretch out as far as the eye can see.

Scoffing at her cowardice, she unhooks the latch and marches ahead.

Steam hangs damp in the air. When she fans it away, sure enough, a tea-party comes into view. Rolling her eyes, she turns the first chair towards herself, only to start.

The patchwork doll of Amami—bowtie askew and button eyes shimmering with condensation—lolls at the jostling. The teacup sewn into his palm sloshes along with it. The same, violent pink as the Cheshire Cat’s tail makes such a pretty contrast to the soft felt of his hair.

Maki squints through the steam. Akamatsu’s arms fold over the plate in front of her, but the sailor collar of her dress does little to cover the angry marks across her plastic doll neck. Tojo looks as prim as ever, porcelain lips painted in a demure smile. Even Hoshi’s mouth is shoddily sewn-up to the red-rounds of his cheeks.

Up above the billowing steam Maki counts several more chairs leading onwards. Frowning, she continues through the haze.

“What is this, Ouma?” she demands, peering between the chairs as she reaches the head of the table. “Just tell me what you want.”

The Mad Hatter blinks owlishly over the lip of his teacup, but only answers with an enthusiastic slurp. To his right is a single high-backed chair, pointedly turned away from the table. A bright magenta cup, steaming with freshly-poured tea, sits in front of it.

The Hatter notices her staring. “It’s very rude to come to a party uninvited, Harumaki-chan.”

She glares. “That’s not an answer.”

“Isn’t it?” he replies. “Well, even if you had been invited, you’re much too early. ”

“Stop speaking in riddles,” she says. _I always hated that about you_ , she doesn’t say.

The Hatter lifts one hand to his forehead, sweeping his teacup out dramatically with the other. Tea sloshes from it, but she deftly dodges. “Poor Harumaki-chan,” he cries, “Always barging in unwanted! Always charging ahead without a thought or a care! Oh, how _dreadful_ it must be, to be so very, very _simple_.”

“Simple?”

He grins again, peering at her through his fingers. “Yes, and if you’re going to crash our party, you might as well look the part!”

In one single motion, he drops the teacup and snaps his fingers. As the china shatters, she feels something tighten around her wrists and ankles. Shimmering thread spools out from her limbs, up into the steam above.

The Hatter’s smile is sharp as he pours himself another cup. “How fitting,” he says. “Now run along, little marionette! We have a party to tend to, and _you’re_ not welcome.”

She tries to fight against the pull, but once a puppet, always a puppet. The Hatter softly clinks his teacup to the magenta one beside him as the gate slams shut.

* * *

“I should end this right now,” Maki says as she ducks under a leaf nearly twice her size.

“Sure you _should_ ,” the Caterpillar says, “but _can_ you?” The letter _U_ floats up from between his pursed lips. “That’s the real question.”

“Obviously,” she replies. “This is my dream. I know what it wants.”

“Oh?” His hair hangs wild around similarly wild eyes as he drapes himself over the side of his perch. “Hey, let’s turn it into a game—see if I can’t guess in 20 Questions!”

Maki fans away the colorful barrage of pipe-smoke question marks as they fly towards her face. “Let’s not.”

“No fun,” he pouts, a pale blue frowny-face drooping from his pouted lips.

“Sorry,” she says, not very sorry at all.

The Caterpillar shrugs, then takes a long pull from his pipe to blow an assortment of shapes into the air. A long-armed hammer. A glass bottle. A single arrow. A familiar flashlight.

“Well?” he asks, as the last one drifts away. “Out with it then.”

It should be easy to say what he wants.

…It _should_.

With great frustration, she forces the bear-trap clench of her jaw apart and—

The pipe pressed up against her lips cuts her off. “Ah-ah-ah,” he says to her glare, each syllable punctuated with a tiny puff of lavender pipe-smoke. The violet of his eyes is strikingly bright among the haze. “Don’t say it unless you mean it.”

“I _do_ mean it,” she says, smacking the pipe away with itching fingers.

The Caterpillar lazes further into the leaf, resting his chin upon one of his many hands. “No, you don’t. But you certainly _want_ to.” He tilts the mouthpiece back and takes a long, indulgent drag. Smoke pours out of him on a sigh as he rolls onto his back.

The color this time is a deep, carmine red. Like fountain pen trails, it loops into words above him. They say,

_After all, it would be so much easier._

Maki’s breath hitches. “I never said that.”

His head tips to the side, one eyebrow raised as smoke continues to trickle out from his lips.

_Then I could put that whole mess behind me._

“Stop putting words in my mouth.”

His smile cuts through her in a way that makes her skin crawl. Red pours out between his teeth. Her stomach turns.

_Then all that guilt would go away._

Pipe-smoke pools around her waist and seeps into her lungs. Around a cough, she says, “You don’t know anything.”

_All I’d have to do is say it—a single, empty apology._

Her eyes burn as she blinks away the smoke trails. “Stop it.”

_Because I do mean it—I_ **_am_ ** _sorry—_

“I said stop!”

_—but really… only for one of them._

She opens her mouth to yell, but chokes on her own dark words. As the sea of smoke engulfs her, she catches one last glimpse of the Caterpillar.

His smile is still there, but oh, how sad it is.

* * *

She’s not surprised when she comes to behind a familiar podium. All things considered, the crown looks right at home on Ouma’s head.

“Which would you like first,” the Red Queen simpers from his perch on the bench. “The sentence or the verdict?”

She crosses her arms. “Jumping the gun, aren’t you?”

He shrugs. “I’d ask the witnesses, but…”

Spotlights illuminate the darkness, lighting podiums up one by one. Each one bears the same familiar portrait frame, the same familiar question-mark.

“I don’t think they’d be of much help,” he finishes, eyes colder than she’s ever seen them.

“And what a shame, too,” says the Cheshire Cat, appearing at the podium to her left. “They tried _so_ hard.”

“A dreadful shame indeed,” the Caterpillar replies, smoke violet as he lounges at the podium to her right. “They died _so_ young.”

“Just terrible!” the Mad Hatter cries, sending tea everywhere in his fervor. “And to think how all of it could have been avoided, too!”

The magenta teacup—miraculously undisturbed beside him—says nothing.

Maki decides this has gone on long enough.

“Ouma,” she calls out, causing the Queen to turn from the cacophony back to her. “Sentence or verdict? I’ll take both.”

“Oho?” he says, straightening to full height. “Well then, I hereby—"

“No,” she says. “I’ll do it myself.”

Unlike his storybook counterpart, the Queen merely sits back, eyes gleaming expectantly.

Maki takes a deep, calming breath. The tension unspools from her white-knuckled grip. She looks to the Queen and says, “Guilty. That’s what you wanted to hear, right?”

The courtroom falls silent. To the Queen’s raised eyebrow, she continues, “I... was a coward. And a fool, and I was almost willing to let everyone die so I wouldn’t have to face the truth.”

“The truth?” the Queen asks, not a question at all.

“That I killed you,” Maki replies. “Indirectly, but still I… I killed you both, and…”

The Queen tilts his head to the side, expression curiously blank.

“And you might have been awful,” she says carefully, “but maybe you weren’t as awful as I wanted to think. And for that, I’m… sorry. I really am.”

And it really is that easy, isn’t it?

The spotlights go out. The Queen’s smile falls into something soft, almost genuine. Perhaps Ouma could have smiled that way too, once.

But before Maki can think much on that, the monarch exclaims, “Now then! The sentence!”

Maki frowns, “I said—”

A hand taps her on the shoulder. Maki turns.

It’s Ouma, plain and simple this time. She opens her mouth—still so many things left unsaid—but he doesn’t let her.

“Your sentence, Harumaki-chan,” he says, with a knowing little smile, “is to live with that truth, and never, _ever_ forget it.”

Then he pushes her away.

And just like Alice, Maki falls

_down_ ,

_down_ ,

_down_ …

* * *

And then she wakes.

The dream ends. It’s yet another day full of heartbeats for Harukawa Maki.

Today, she rouses herself and stands, feeling oddly lighter than she has in months. As the morning goes on—like Cheshire-grins and pipe-smoke—the dream eventually fades.

The lightness, at least, remains.

_“I wonder if I've been changed in the night [...] Was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I'm not the same, the next question is 'Who in the world am I?'”_

**― Lewis Carroll**

**Author's Note:**

> Remember that time I wrote this fic and then months later that [DR Sweets Paradise café collaboration](https://www.sweets-paradise.jp/collaboration/2019/10/10288/) made Cheshire Cat!Ouma merch and so twitter erupted with Cheshire Cat!Ouma designs out of the blue and I thought I was having a stroke? Because I sure do!
> 
> In all seriousness, when the Zine crew asked me what characters I wanted to work with, I jumped at the chance to write something about Maki and her lingering survivor's guilt. I'm sure anyone who's read my V3 fics knows how much I love the dynamic between Maki, Ouma, and Momota, but in all those cases, Momota acted as the pivot character with which I explored the Maki & Ouma dynamic. It was nice to step back and just focus on the two of them (mostly) without Momota in this one, and use this chance to get at one of my biggest, lingering gripes about V3—namely how the script never gave Maki a chance to recognize how her actions cost not only Momota's life, but Ouma's as well. 
> 
> Anyway, I just think Maki is neat and I hope this short & sweet fic got that across.


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